Robot Boy
by Indigo Angels
Summary: Hannibal and Face in Vietnam, first meeting and all that! Written from Hannibal's POV and loosely inspired by the Linkin Park song of the same name. Some swearing and mentions of suicide, but don't be put off, it's not too dark. Honest!


I've never liked hospitals; it's the smell I think. Plenty of people think that hospitals smell of disinfectant and bleach and cleanliness, I don't, I just think they smell of death. Field hospitals like this one are the worst; I remember my first time in one back in Korea. I was just a kid, first tour out and we'd been blasted out of our hooch by a stray missile. Friendly bloody fire. Two of the guys had been killed; I'd just suffered superficial burns, but the smell of that place, the charred flesh. The charred flesh of my friends, well, I don't think it's ever left my nose since.

So, anyway, it takes a lot to make me stay in one of these places when I'm not at death's door, and that kind of sums this kid up; he's certainly a lot of something.

I didn't take to him at first, none of us did. Lt. Frisco wasn't even cold in his glad bag waiting to get shipped home when this kid was foisted on us, loud, brash, arrogant... just the last thing we all needed when our nerves were shredded as thin as they were. No one called him by his name, no one even bothered to find out what it was. He was just FNG, Fucking New Guy, to everyone, but the crazy thing was he didn't even seem to care.

I should have paid more attention to him from the start, I certainly failed him with my duty of care in those first few weeks, but I was still reeling after Jose's death and to be honest he just made it so easy for me. Kept himself to himself, was snarky or sullen to anyone who spoke to him, refused to eat with the others, drink with them... He was shit hot on manoeuvres though, that's probably the first time I really looked at him, when he was the first one through one of my killer obstacle courses. First one through, hardly a splash of mud on him then he drops to his knee and takes out all five targets one after the other. Dead centre every one.

That was the first time I ever saw him smile. I know that for sure 'cause it nearly blew me away, awakened feelings in me that I thought I'd long since repressed. Of course as soon as the kid saw me watching him, the smile was gone, back came that sullen frown and he was off, back to the hooch to lie on his back and read and ignore everyone else. I watched him retreating, the backs of his ears glowing red as Ray ran in a reasonable second. He saw where my eyes were and clapped me on the back as he collapsed on the floor, "You need to watch that one, John," he'd told me, "he's a dark horse." He was indeed.

I did watch then, very closely, tried to get the others to stop calling him FNG, but the kid was no help to me at all. I asked him what he wanted to be called, I mean, Templeton is a bit of a mouthful to yell in the field, but he'd just shrugged. "Don't care," he'd muttered, "Don't intend staying long. FNG is just fine."

I remember being confused by that at the time. Where the hell did he think he was going to go? Did he have some cosy desk job behind lines in his sights? Or was his eye on another unit with another commander? For reasons I'm only just beginning to work out, I didn't like that idea much at all.

Then we got our first job with him along for the ride. I could tell he was shit scared, he hardly slept the night before and threw up his breakfast as we were jogging out to the Huey, but he sure as hell wouldn't let on to anyone. He sat in that chopper, just taking all the flack from the others, all the new guy teasing from Murdock, his back as straight as a rod and his eyes dry and steady. I was too busy watching him and wondering what the hell was going on in his head to intervene. In the end it was Ray who had to tell the guys to lay off him.

It didn't take long for the shit to hit the fan as always. The maps we had were old, and Charlie were much further forward than we were led to believe. In the chaos we got split up, Ray and BA went one way, me and the kid another and when we'd ran as far as we could, we dug in under some bushes and prepared to wait the night out.

It didn't look like the kid intended to say much in our enforced night together, and spending eight hours holed up in a one meter square hole with a silent companion is no fun for anyone, so I pulled out my hip flask and made him have some, but even after having almost half the bottle between us he was only gracing me with single word answers to my most basic of questions. I asked if he had a girlfriend, no, what his parents did, they were dead, what he'd studied at college, business, why he'd joined up, he'd wanted to. But all the time there was this _bitterness_, this raging anger, just bubbling below the surface, trying to explode, to blast out and rage at the whole world but the kid kept it all back. Kept a lid on it so hard and so tight, despite all my questions, all my prompting – it was more than impressive.

So, hating the dark silence of the night, I talked about me. My home, my parents, the girl I had left behind, the reasons I had joined up, and for the first time since I'd met him, the kid had had something other than open hostility in his eyes. It wasn't anything friendly, don't get me wrong, I suppose neutral is more the word I'd use. But at least it wasn't hate and anger, and they were all I'd seen so far.

I'd been talking about all my reasons for joining up, about wanting to protect those not strong enough to look after themselves, about wanting to put right some of the many wrongs of the world, about standing up for victims when I heard an ironic _humph_ from the other side of the tiny clearing. "What?" I'd asked him, genuinely perplexed.

"You believe in all that shit?" he'd asked and the bitterness in his voice appalled me.

"You don't?" I'd asked him calmly.

"In my experience no one is there for the little guys," he'd muttered. "They are only there to serve the needs of the strong, to be walked on, it's their role. And the only way they are going to get out of a situation like that is if they sort it themselves. Drastic measures. There's no hero coming in to save the day."

It was the most I'd ever heard him say and it shocked me into silence for a few minutes. How could someone so young be so bitter? What had happened to this kid to taint his view of life so black?

"You don't believe in heroes?" I asked him and I heard his head shake in the darkness, "So, why _did_ you join up then?"

He was quiet for a minute, and I almost thought he wasn't going to answer but then he did, his voice quiet in the thick night, "It was a door..." was all he said, and by the time I'd pondered that in silence for a few minutes, he'd fallen asleep.

As soon as it was light enough to see, we set off. We were close enough to the RV that we made it there within an hour, and after skulking in the bushes for twenty minutes, the familiar _thump thump thump _of a Huey could be heard in the distance and I knew that Murdock, bless him to the bottom of his heart, was coming to pull us out. I told the kid to get ready, warned him that the noise of the chopper would bring Charlie out and he nodded, looking pale in the early morning light.

Then, like an angel from above, Murdock appeared, dropping down to hover barely a foot above the water of the rice paddy and we broke our cover sprinting through the knee high water, soaking ourselves in the rush to get out of the open. But as we ran, a commotion on the other side of the paddy drew our eyes, two more figures burst out of the jungle, US fatigues, unmistakably Ray and BA, even from this distance, the shouts of the pursuing VC audible over the thrum of the chopper's engines.

The kid and I were so close to the chopper now that we couldn't stand up for the downdraft. I knew exactly what I was going to do and dived into the Huey, grabbing one of the side mounted Thompsons and ramming it into place, desperate to give the guys some cover as they ran in. But the damn thing was stuck, wouldn't click into place, wouldn't come out again and I yelled at it in fury, cold fear rolling in my chest. I couldn't lose another man, I wouldn't lose Ray or BA, not for the sake of a stupid jammed gun, I just couldn't.

And then I heard automatic fire from close range and looked up and there was the damn kid, down on one knee in the middle of the paddy field, grease gun on his shoulder, laying down cover for the others as they splashed to safety. The cold fear grabbed me again, but this time for the kid. Ray and BA had passed him now, Ray had yelled for him to follow, but the stupid kid hadn't moved. Instead he'd stayed exactly where he was, spraying the jungle with bullets as more and more of the VC swarmed towards him.

"What that fool doing?" BA yelled as he strapped himself into the Huey and suddenly it hit me, all the hatred, the bitterness, the determination that he wasn't staying long.

_"You don't believe in heroes? So, why did you join up then?"_

_"It was a door..."_

And I suddenly realised what he meant, a door to where. "Fucking hell!" I shouted as I leaped out of the chopper and ran for him. Kid didn't believe in heroes? I'd fucking show him.

But I was too late. I actually heard the thud of the bullets hitting him, heard his gasp and saw him thrown backwards into the rice, blue eyes wide, wide open in shock. Instantly there was the comforting noise of the Thompson thumping away behind me and Charlie dived for cover, allowing me to pick the damn stupid kid up and haul him back to the Huey. I couldn't tell if he was dead or not, but either way, we never leave anyone behind so he was coming with me.

I almost threw him into the back of the chopper and Ray was all ready with the medical kit. BA was yelling like a man possessed as he blasted away with the Thompson and Murdock kept on shouting, "Is he gonna make it boss? Don't let another one go..." while he flew like a banshee to the nearest MASH.

It was hard to tell if he was alive or not. He had two bullet wounds to his chest, one either side, both through and through and the way one of them was bubbling up, looked like he'd clipped a lung. I put the oxygen mask on over his face and felt soft stubble under my fingers and froze realising for the first time how young this kid actually was, he couldn't have been more than seventeen, younger than I was when I hit Korea and I suddenly knew there was no way I could let him die.

"Come on kid!" I bent and shouted into his ear, knowing no one else could hear me, "Don't do this to me! You can't die on me! Not now, not when I'm just getting to know you! Come on!" There was no response. "I know why you came," I told him, "Out here, I mean. I know it was the door you were looking for, but listen to me, kid; I can give you another door! A better door, a door with a future!" I grabbed his hand and rubbed it, squeezing the lax fingers, "I need you to do this with me, kid! I need you to hold on, to want to hold on and I swear to you, I'll make things better. Whatever it is, whatever demons are chasing you, I'll help you bring them down. You think there's nothing left in this world for you? Well, you're wrong," I had to keep shouting over the noise of the Huey, but I could feel my throat closing up, "You've got a family here that needs you, and a CO here who wants you, and friends just waiting for you to open up to them, kid, so, come on! Don't give up, fight!"

I hadn't really known what to expect, I didn't really think there was anything left in him, but when I looked up his eyes were open and on me, huge and as bright blue as the sky back home and I think I fell in love with him right there and then. He just stared at me for another long second, before his hand, shaking and smeared in his own blood lifted up to touch the mask and I understood, moving it away, bending over so he could whisper in my ear.

"Face," was what he'd said and I'd frowned at him, not really understanding. A ghost of a smile had passed his lips and he'd whispered again, louder this time, "Face. That's what you can call me," and I'd smiled back at him and held his hand even tighter and started praying, something I'd not done for years, because if anyone deserved a hero it was this boy.

Which is why I'm still sitting at the side of his bed, still chewing on the cigar they won't damn well let me smoke, why I'm waiting here for him to wake up, because now I just know he will wake up. As I said before, I don't like hospitals and it takes something special to make me stay in one of these places when I'm not at death's door. Well, now I know that's what I've got here, something really special, and I'm sure as all hell not going to give him up. Not ever.


End file.
